After an exhausting day at work, when you crawl into bed seeking comfort and quietude in the soft recesses of your pillow, casting aside the tensions and exertions of your daily life, succumbing at last to a delicious sweet slumber, a strident nasal voice wafts across from the park, which is diagonally opposite your house. It startles you out of your wits, assaults your senses and demolishes the tranquility of the night. In an instant you are wide awake. With your sleep effectively destroyed, you are sitting upright on your bed wondering if you have accidentally passed on into thenetherworld. Not before long you discover, much to your discomfiture, that the "sounds of music" are in fact the community's way of articulating its pent-up religious beliefs and affirmations.If our devotion to God and our faith in following the holy scriptures to the letter is to be measured in decibels, then we Indians must undoubtedly and unanimously be declared as having passed this test with flying colours. The devout, pious and the God-fearing multitude probably feel that the only wayto get the Almighty's attention and be heard over the din is by creating an enormous racket themselves.September, the month which heralds the beginning of festivals, is awaited with much eagerness, when each devotee can give vent to his religious ardour and exercise his vocal chords as well. This is the only time in the year that some of the pavements are cleared of the mound of litter, piled up construction material and other debris to make way for a shamiana. Tape recorders and loud speakers are installed to jolt the neighbourhood into aspiritual awakening. Cassette recorders will blare out religious songs, songs which are strangely familiar. Familiar because the singer is belting out songs whose tunes are strikingly similar to those of the latest Hrthik Roshan starrer. These cassettes are then played and replayed till thecassettes themselves ultimately protest and squeak to a stop.Apart from the cassette-playing devotees, there is yet another breed who take the mike themselves to yodel a few discordant bhajans. People who would not be heard outside of their bathroom are suddenly seized by a fierce desire to exhibit their talent to the neighbourhood at large. Bereft of any tune, exhibiting disdain for either tone or pitch, they will gleefully warble on, oblivious of the trauma inflicted on their unwilling listeners who unfortunately have no choice but to bear the brunt of their vocal energies.Usually, and most unfortunately, these celestial performances start only late in the evenings and continue well past the witching hour. So you either fret and fume, heaping curses on their sudden urge to put on a public display of their religious proclivities, or just throw up your hands in despair and accept it as a part of your ethos and culture.So for those of you who have been mute spectators (listeners) in the past, the ruling of the Supreme Court literally comes as a godsend. The highest court in the land has given a decision to the effect that noise pollution will not be tolerated even in the name of religion. Not that very much will be achieved, considering the fact that the Supreme Court's ruling about littering attracting a heavy penalty does not seem to have made much of an impact in arousing the civic consciousness of the people. Hopefully, theforthcoming festivities will see more restraint amongst the populace when it comes to turning up the volume of their speakers. Hopefully, the forthcomingfestivals will see genuine devotion practised in fitting silence, keeping in mind the sensitivities of their fellow human beings.
